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BOSTON - As the Bruins built up a 13-game point streak, it was easy to look past some of the bad habits that began to creep into their game. Throughout that stretch, the Black & Gold found themselves trailing in seven of those contests, requiring several thrilling comebacks to salvage points.
There was no such comeback in the cards on Saturday night. Things caught up to the Bruins a bit, as they dropped a 4-1 decision to the Colorado Avalanche, marking Boston's first regulation loss at TD Garden this season.
"That's a losing game," said Brad Marchand. "You can't continue to get down by a couple goals, especially with really good teams. Teams like that really know how to keep a lead, and regardless of how many times we've come back in the past, eventually it's going to catch up to us like it did tonight.
"Unfortunately, it is good to lose every now and again, good to be able to right the ship again, so maybe this is that game."

One area of Boston's game that coach Bruce Cassidy was particularly disappointed with was its lack of urgency, especially with one of the top teams in the league in town, coupled with seeing its eight-game win streak end on Thursday night.
"We kind of talked about it. Felt a little more excitement in the room tonight. I thought we'd be better," said Cassidy. "We have one of the best records in the league, but I don't care - it's not a switch you can just turn on. There's too much parody in this league, and you're playing one of what I think is one of the elite teams out West as well…I thought we would come out a little cleaner than we did."
Marchand said Boston's 13-point cushion in the Atlantic Division is not factoring into the team's recent struggles.
"We're obviously aware that we're in a good position, but it's not something that we really talk about," said Marchand. "The seasons gets long and that's no excuse, but you're not going to be perfect every game and we know that. We have to find ways to win, but we do have to realize the mistakes we're making and start to make improvements if we want to continue to get better. That's what good teams do. That's what we'll look at again tomorrow and try to bounce back Monday."

BOS Recap: Wagner scores lone goal in 4-1 loss

Wagner Cashing In

The Bruins' lone goal came from Chris Wagner, who tipped home a John Moore shot from the point to put Boston ahead, 1-0, with 6:46 remaining in the first period. The tally gave Wagner goals in consecutive games and also marked Moore's first point of the season.
"I actually thought [Sean] Kuraly's line did a nice job," Cassidy said of his fourth line, which drew the task of checking Colorado's top trio for much of the night. "That's as tough of an assignment as you're going to get in this league, and we're able to score a goal, go to the net, play in their end a little bit. I thought they did fine."

COL@BOS: Wagner tips shot past Grubauer in front

Coming to An End

The Bruins 17-game home point streak (12-0-5) marked the second-longest in club history to start a season, trailing only a 21-game stretch in 1973 (19-0-2).